


The Youth And Beauty Brigade

by spockandawe



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Caliginous Romance | Kismesis, Canon-Typical Violence, Death, F/F, Helmstrolls, IN SPACE!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-07-26
Packaged: 2018-07-26 20:05:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7588225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spockandawe/pseuds/spockandawe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The low fuel warnings feel like they’re blinking at the back of your eyeballs—annoying as ever, and you still haven’t figured out how to break that part of the system—but hey. Not actually your problem. You’re the pure polished <em>pinnacle</em> of Alternian engineering and medicine (polished! pinnacle! hahaha, cracks you up every time), you’ve never needed to worry about fuel. And oh dear, it looks like nobody bothered to line up your orders before they booted you up. It looks like things have been left to your better judgment. Your better judgment says: ground-to-orbit protocol II, full thrust.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Youth And Beauty Brigade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [isozyme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/isozyme/gifts).
  * Inspired by [we are the reckless](https://archiveofourown.org/works/701013) by [isozyme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/isozyme/pseuds/isozyme). 



          You don’t even know what wakes you up at first. Your cameras come online before your eyes do-- not that it does you much good, only a few of them get a nice crisp picture anymore, and two _more_ have stopped working since the last time you were booted up. Which has been—wow. A long time, if you’re going to believe your internal chronometer (not that you’re sure you should—it’s a broken piece of shit, just like the rest of you).

 _Finally_ your nutrient monitoring system pings you to let you know that hey, surprise, you’ve got a nice dose of drugs messing with your system. It’s booting you up way faster than what comes naturally, that’s for sure. You can feel all the ways your engines are catching wrong as they try to spin up too fast. And you definitely feel it when a fuse blows. _Fuck,_ that stings.

          The low fuel warnings feel like they’re blinking at the back of your eyeballs—annoying as ever, and you still haven’t figured out how to break that part of the system—but hey. Not _actually_ your problem. You’re the pure polished pinnacle of Alternian engineering and medicine (polished! pinnacle! hahaha, cracks you up every time), you’ve _never_ needed to worry about fuel. And oh dear, it looks like nobody bothered to line up your orders before they booted you up. It looks like things have been left to your better judgment. Your better judgment says: ground-to-orbit protocol II, full thrust.

          The cameras still working in your bridge catch the array of warning lights that flicker on. It’s always an annoying half-second beyond when you feel them in your nervous system, but it’s so _pretty_ seeing them all laid out for you like that on the dashboard.

          And oh, would you look at that. There’s a crewmember picking herself off the ground. And another one sitting in a chair-- oh, hm. No, that’s a corpse. You can see his ghost standing right behind his old body, still not quite sure what just happened. _Ha_ , wait, is that the idiot who bought you from your last owner? Given the _lovely_ judgment skills that decision suggests, you can’t say you’re actually very surprised that this happened to him.

          The crewmember hits the bridge pressure controls—those haven’t worked for sweeps, is what you might have told her if you’d felt like being helpful—and now that you think of it, you can isolate the little throbbing pain at the back of your jaw that means a warning from the life support systems. Of course, _your_ personal helmsblock is sealed. Not your problem. Thrusters stay on.

          The crewmember is scrambling for the manual hatch seal. She shouts, “Slow _down_ , you stupid bolt-bucket! Give me half a moment, this ship is so broken, you don’t even know—”

          Not that you’d ever deliberately try to accommodate her, but annoyingly enough, your engines pick that moment to stall out. The ship hits ground with a heavy enough _thud_ that you can feel it in your bones, but you don’t stop pushing your thrusters.

          You flick through your camera feeds, looking for the rest of your crew. There must be a few others, and corpses don’t count! But by the time you’re starting to actually find your balance in the air, well… nope. Even with how many blind spots you have these days, _somebody_ should have popped into view by now. You turn your focus back to what is, apparently, your one singular crewmember. Who’s now banging on your oxygen system with a wrench. It looks like we’ve got a real engineer here, folks. You can’t stop yourself from laughing and _laughing_ . This is going to be _interesting_.

          She does manage to sort out the life support before you’re even close to clearing atmosphere. You’re off your game today! And then she comes to pay you a visit.

The first thing out of her mouth is, “What the fuck is your _damage?_ ” These days, your eyes get better resolution than most of your cameras, so you take the opportunity to look her over. You’ve been… more impressed. And she’s still talking. “I’m Vriska fucking Serket, traitor to the New Crown, the one and only—”

          Blah blah blah, _et cetera_.

          “I’m Aradia,” you say. “And I don’t care.”

          Oh— Ugh, you can feel her in your pan. You’ve still got your thrusters on, and you’re gaining altitude, but you’re not sure you could actually change that. Well— why not! You try to cut all power to your engines, but what’s-her-name— _Vriska—_ has your controls frozen. Oh, you don’t like that at all.

          But still, she’s looking at _you_ like she doesn’t like what she’s seeing either. _Good_.

          The two of you stay like that all the way until you start to clear atmosphere. You don’t have any way to beat her, not like this. But oh, the difference between the two of you is that you don’t have anything to _lose_. From the look of her, you wouldn’t say she’s much better off! But she has something left she’s fighting for, and there’s something distinct and lovely about that kind of desperation, that last-ditch, no-hope struggle to survive.

          So she doesn’t have a choice. And she knows it. She lets go of your pan slowly. You shift in your wires, run your tongue over your teeth. Is she afraid of you? You hope so.

          You’re clear of the atmosphere now. Without proper orders, without a heading. So you decide for yourself. You point yourself out towards deep space, and accelerate. You don’t drop your eyes from Vriska’s as the engines rattle the deckplate under her feet.

          Eventually, she turns and goes. The first thing she does is _tape_ your throttle wide open. Ugh, it feels like someone is pulling on a handful of your hair. And she changes your heading. Barely. You’re fairly certain she just did that so you’d be heading somewhere _she_ picked instead of somewhere _you_ picked. Cute.

          It isn’t long after that before the ghosts start paying attention to her. She must have booted you up as soon as she came on board if they’re only just now noticing her. They usually lurk in nice little out-of-the-way corners—except for the gunner, you’re almost sure she mopes around in your engines. You don’t have any cameras down there, so you can’t say for sure, but whenever you can’t find her anywhere else, it feels like someone is tickling the inside of your thorax. It’s nice when they stay out of your way, because when they decide they’re interested in something, they’re a _nuisance_.

          The salesman’s ghost is floating behind his body—you’re sure he’ll realize it isn’t _his_ anymore eventually—and blocking your best camera’s view of your own control panels, thank you very much. And your old crew is trailing around behind Vriska. And… hm. From the way she jumps and flinches, you’d wager your salary (it’s funny, because you don’t have one of those!) that she’s seeing them too. That is nice. Makes you wish you had more old crew around to keep her company! But after your first crew, you had the knack of getting rid of them too fast for them to think of you as _home_.

          The salesman _definitely_ hasn’t been around long enough for you to be home. You can see Vriska scoop out his right eye and pop it in her mouth. Oh good, she's superstitious too. You toy with the idea of turning on your comms to say something about all the diseases she probably just picked up. And then she drags him off down your cargo bay. It leaves smears of green all over your floors. Rude! You are a ship used to only the _finest_ maintenance and cleanliness protocols! Haha _haha_ — She tosses the body into the airlock. His ghost hesitates for a moment—but he follows his body. They usually do.

          And by now, you’ve had a chance to get a good look at the healing red patches on the back of her horns. You can filter by sign and approximate blood color (maybe if you had any decent functioning cameras you could see about getting a _proper_ color), plus you’ve got a few good captures of her face from multiple angles. You flex the fingers you don’t have anymore in preparation for some good old-fashioned sleuth work.

          Not necessary, as it turns out! You don’t hardly get to sleuth at _all_ , because the face of the troll who just stole you is the face currently plastered over all the top articles on every major news site you access. Boringggg. And she thinks a bad haircut and a quick hornjob is going to be enough of a disguise to fool anyone? She wasn’t even smart enough to give you a fake name or even a fake sign. You’re _insulted_! And it’s easy as anything to dig back into her old social media accounts and connect her with the pretty little legislacerator who’s taken official charge of the case. You almost send a message off to the nearest military outpost, just for the heck of it. Will they offline you? Maybe. Will it be totally worth it?! _Maybe!_

          No, this is such a wonderful mess already, you _have_ to see how Vriska is going to make it worse. Just being involved with the new empress is juicy enough! And you’d _think_ that any pupa with half a brain would know to stay in favor with the new ruler they just helped install in power. Maybe… maybe try _not_ assassinating her oldest childhood friend? Possibly? _Ha_ , you don’t even care why she did it! It’s good enough to know that it _happened_. Maybe after they execute her, they’ll confiscate you and refit you as an imperial helmsman. You’d love to see what an empress’s ghost looks like.

          Vriska’s comm unit chimes, and you’re _far_ too nosy to _not_ hack in.

> **H4V3 YOU CONS1D3R3D TH3 NOBL3 PL34 B4RG41N?**

          And Vriska—throws her comm unit in your cooling tank. Rude! Again! It’s all you can do to not laugh out loud.

          You wait until she turns to leave, and you ask, “Afraid they’ll kill you?”

          She snaps, “Afraid I’ll die of old age before you clear this star system!”

          Mm. You smile to yourself and shift your weight in your wires. Still as comfortable as they day they installed you! You expect they’ll be just as comfortable for the next helmsman or ten before they finally wear out. “You’re afraid they won’t catch you. That _she_ won’t catch you. You’ll be all alone, and so very free, and you aren’t going to know what to do with yourself, will you?”

          Her claws half-flex before she tries to hide it. You’ve already captured it on camera from four separate angles. She’s talking again—but you’ve finally reached open space. You’ve got better things to do.

 _Detected change in ship mass: 102 kilos, deflection of course: 3.18 degrees. On course for reentry: 348.2 hours. Radar clear_.

          You come back to yourself just in time to hear her shout, “Fuck, _wait_ , at least let me strap in—”

          She does bruise very prettily. It’s nice watching her limp around and patching up her broken horn, but by _far_ , the most satisfying thing is looking at the knuckles she skinned punching you in the stomach. You can hardly even see the steel stays at _all_ underneath the jumpsuit fabric, and that’s just how you like it.

          The trip is boring. Vriska watches the ghosts. You watch Vriska. The high point is when you turn on the fire alarm, and it takes her five whole days to find the off switch. By the time she figures it out, you’re beginning to close in on the Colchecine system.

          It’s a beautiful landing! You crash yourself right into a field, not close to a city—as per your new captain’s orders—but within walking distance of one. Also just like your captain ordered. Not very strict parameters! So she can walk to a city. It’ll take her a few hours, but she _can_ do it.

          It’s nice and foggy out. Good weather for ghosts. _Your_ ghosts have tucked themselves away, the way they always do on planets. You figure that you can give Vriska an hour or so to get out of earshot, then go poking around the planet yourself. Be back before she misses you, never notice a thing. You might have safeguards programmed into you that you can’t _abandon_ your captain, but—abandon. What a nice word. What a _flexible_ word.

          At least, exploring is the plan until Vriska comes into your helmsblock and unscrews the navigation line from your column.

          You ask, “You don’t trust me?”

          Her face is inches from yours, but she doesn’t look at you as she leans in close and reaches around to yank your nav-jack out of your thoracic support column. Your breath catches at the sudden, sharp pain. You can feel her breath on your neck. You might still be able to fly, but you’d be flying blind. Vriska doesn’t say a word to you before she turns and stalks out of your block, and leaves the ship.

          So instead of exploring, you’re bored. Painfully, indescribably bored. Nothing to do but plan how you’re going to make Vriska sorry. Well, and you track her through the city. The planet’s a dump, but that just means nobody’s been taking care of the security for all the tiny little cameras littered all over the place. They’re _awful_ . Makes you appreciate the camera quality in your ship! But it’s something to keep you busy. Vriska watches the cameras as she walks. You’d almost think she was watching you watching her—but she doesn’t know you’re on the other end, she doesn’t know _half_ of what you can do.

          After she gets jumped by a gang of thugs and shoots one through the throat, you lose her. At least she picked a group of criminals smart enough to take out the cameras near their hideout. You assume! Or Vriska’s been killed and dumped in an alley somewhere. Either way! To entertain yourself, you go digging around in old social media accounts again. You find a picture of Colchecine. On the account of one Terezi Pyrope. Vriska’s only half in the frame and Terezi isn’t much better, but you can see the way her free arm is around Vriska’s neck, and the way both of them are grinning.

          Vriska doesn’t come back until nearly a full day later. She’s dragging an overloaded hovercart, and your best external camera can only just pick up the fang marks on the side of her neck. When she starts unloading, you’re barely paying attention until you see her hefting a pair of sizeable cannons and dragging them around to the front of your ship. Ohhh, _yes, please_.

          You’re practically fidgeting in your wires, watching her struggle to lift and mount the first cannon, before you give in and activate your external speakers. “Need help?”

          Vriska gives the speakers an ugly look, but! You can see how wobbly she is, and sure, you know your mounts are maybe a _little_ bit stripped, you’ve maybe seen better days. But that’s no excuse for how hard she’s apparently fighting this.

          Finally, she whacks your hull with a wrench and says, “Lift the skiff two feet and hold it there. Thanks.” Easy as anything. And once you’ve done that, she adds a downright insulting, “Don’t drop it,” before shimmying down to fight your stabilizer struts. You really, _really_ consider dropping the ship on her. Just to spite her. Maybe another time, after she reconnects your nav-jack.

          After a few quiet moments, she says, “What the hell did you even do to this ship?”

          Ha! You bet she noticed the burn spots. Or the one burn spot. The one large, _large_ burn spot. “Rocks fell, everyone died.” You can’t stop yourself from laughing at the memory, and the ship shakes along with you.

          “Watch it!”

          “Scared?”

          Is she using that wrench as a _wrench_? Or is she using it as a hammer? Yes, hammer those bolts out of your hull. That’s how we assemble things. Whatever, she seems to be getting the job done. It’s not like you’re in a position to complain about people mistreating the equipment!

          She slams the wrench against another bolt. “You want these cannons as much as I do, come on—”

          You can see her getting more and more unsteady as she works. You can see it in her face when she decides _good enough_ and starts trying to reattach your wires. You can hear sirens, out there in the fog. Hasn’t she noticed them? You’re _fairly_ certain she doesn’t actually want to be arrested. She’s still fumbling with the wires.

          “I don’t need cannons,” you declare, and swing your nose around to face the incoming police ships. You _don’t_ need cannons. Not for something like this. You take them out with rocks. One at a time, just good old-fashioned psionics. You’re a ship, and even if they aren’t helmed, you know right where to hit them to take them out.

          Vriska stumbles most of the way out from underneath you, and stops, wobbling back and forth. “Whoa. Nice.”

          You sniff, and throw your rocks a little faster, a little harder. Vriska takes out a pistol and takes a few potshots at the last few police ships. You graciously do not tell her that her assistance was entirely unnecessary and also she didn’t actually manage to hit any of them. When you open your airlock for her, she falls into you more than she really _steps_.

          You don’t bother waiting for her to get to her feet before you demand, “Give me control of the ship.”

          She stumbles to her feet and towards your helmsblock. You’ve taken out all the police ships, but a few of the officers have reached you by now, and are pounding on your airlock. You—should go higher. You _can_ go higher. Even without the nav-jack. Why can’t you take off?

          By the time Vriska lurches into your block, you barely even care about the nav-jack anymore. And it doesn’t help when she jams it clumsily back into your neck. You barely even process the pain, you’re locked tight in your wires, straining as hard as you can, and getting nowhere. Your pan is pounding with orders to _stay grounded_ , you can’t—you don’t know how to go higher, you can’t remember how to fly, it hurts not to be on the ground, _all you want to do is touch down and open your doors for them—_

          “They’ve hooked something up,” Vriska says. “Ignition-kill—”

          “Take the wrench,” you grit out. “Break my pilot controls. Smash them. _Let me do this myself.”_

          And she doesn’t listen. She _doesn’t listen_. She takes a step back and says, “That’s giving you the keys to the kingdom, fuck that noise—”

          You’re breathing too fast, too shallow, but bare your teeth, and _fight_ the urge to land. “I might have control. And I’ll save myself. And I’ll save _you_ in the process. Are you _really_ going to say no to that?”

          “Well _I_ want the new empress to give me a ride on her glorious holy tits, but that’s not going to happen either! Where’s the signal coming from? I’ll find a way to disrupt it.”

          “Everywhere,” you hiss. “It’s _everywhere_ , let me go, let me go, _let me go—”_

          You feel her in your pan, and you throw her hard against the wall. “ _No_ .” You watch her as she climbs to her feet, and you’re fighting back, pushing as hard as you can, and you can tell it isn’t going to be _enough_ . “Kill the pilot controls Vriska. Kill them. I need you to _kill them now_.”

          And she tries to get into your pan. _Again_. You grab her by the horns and slam her head into the floor.

          “Will you let me do this _my_ way?” she asks. As if _you’re_ the one inconveniencing her!

          She’s in your pan. You can feel it, you can feel her crawling up the inside of your skull. She’s got your psionics. You can’t hold onto her, you feel her slipping away, standing under her own power. You can’t get ahold of her again, she _has you_.

          You roll the ship. You almost go crashing into a stand of trees, but it’s worth it, to see her slam into the ceiling, then the floor. There are more sirens. More ships closing in. You can’t take these ones out, it’s all you can do to stay a bare few feet off the ground. “ _Do it, Vriska_.”

          She hesitates and _hesitates_. You’re certain she isn’t going to do it. This is the end. That’s all there is. And then she takes two unsteady steps across the cabin, lifts the wrench and brings it down on the controls. The acceleration as you speed upward knocks her off her feet, but you can barely spare a thought for her. It feels as good as the first time you ever flew, and all you can do is laugh and laugh and laugh.

          Once you reach open space, Vriska sulks. Oh, she certainly sulks. She even tries to kill the ghosts. You don’t think you have to even tell her how ridiculous that is, you get the impression she’s realized how comical she is on her own. And that’s even more delicious, isn’t it.

          You’re almost certain she wants to kill you too.

          Well, _you’re_ as happy as anything. After a few nights of watching your original crew play cards with each other, you go digging around, looking for anything someone might have left behind. You find the gunner’s old deck hidden in a little hidden cubby underneath her old bunk. It’s the same deck the ghosts play with. The cards are marked the exact same way.

          So you pass the time looking up new solitaire games on the net and teaching them all to yourself. You pin the cards up against the wall opposite your helmscolumn and play for hours and _hours_.

          The cards are cheaply made and thin. When you lift them with your psionics, the light silhouettes the symbols and numbers right through the back of the cards. It bothers Vriska. So it immediately becomes your new favorite thing about your deck.

          And she can’t leave it alone. She’s watching you play and glaring and the cards, and just like clockwork, the way she does every night— “That’s cheating.”

          You snap the cards together and cut the deck. “Knowing the way things will end isn’t cheating.”

          The look on her face says better than words just how much she disagrees. You’re hoping for an argument, so you can brush her off and make her even angrier, but instead she asks, “Then how are we going to end? Tell me _that_.”

          That’s so obvious that at first you don’t even think she actually wants an answer. But she hasn’t taken her eyes off you. You hold out the deck. She hesitates, her hand over the cards, then shoves them out into a fan and snatches a card from the middle of the deck. Even before she turns it over, you know it’s the black empress. Nothing you weren't already aware of.

          “We’re going to die,” you tell her.

          “Like the poor fucks who used to crew this wreck?” She twitches like she wants to look back over her shoulder, but she doesn’t take her eyes off your face. You could have told her that the ghosts are hovering in the crew quarters tonight. You could tell her all the times they’ve stood over her bunk, watching her sleep. She can see them, not hear them. But you can hear the way they whisper. Vriska is still watching you, and you think of all those news bulletins, the way the history is written so clearly up and down her face. You think of photos of Vriska, smiling and happy on Colchecine, a friendly arm around her shoulders.

          We’re going to die? Like who? “Like Eridan Ampora,” you answer.

          Her hand snaps to her holster—empty. She clutches at it, like she might find her pistol if she just searches long enough. Her eyes are locked on yours. “How did you know _—_ ” You hold out the cards. She takes the top one, tears it in half without looking down. You watch as the black empress flutters to the floor. “How did you _know_?!”

          You bring it up on a viewscreen, just over her shoulder. She has to take a half-step back to keep you and the screen both in her sights. It’s an unlovely picture of her, unbroken horns, bloody nose dripping on her white dress uniform. Shouting something. You wish you knew what, but it’s only a still image.

          “Terezi Pyrope has been broadcasting your crimes across the net, across all comm frequencies, since before you left the Mac-F1 cluster.” Those crimes are rolling across the screen, under the unchanging, unblinking picture of Vriska. “She’s not far behind at all. Just look at the time stamp on these.”

          You deliberately turn your attention from Vriska, ignore her in favor of the screen, the long, scrolling list of crimes. “It’s impressive, really. You pulled him apart so well. Thoughtless, though. And cruel. I’m sure that just comes naturally to you.”

          “Don’t act like you’re better than me,” she snarls. “What happened to your crew? What did you do to them?”

 _First_ crew, though you don’t bother to correct her. It’s fine, it’s one of your _favorite_ stories. You lean forward, as much as your wires will allow. Your hair falls into her face, and she grabs it in a fist, holds it back. You lock eyes with her. “I flew us through a star.” The look on her face is the best thing you’ve seen in sweeps. Her hand is still in your hair.

          “Did it make you feel better?” She won’t look away from you. “Did it make you _free?”_

          “ _Yes,_ ” you laugh. Before she can move away, you turn your head, bite her hand. Your teeth sink into the meat between thumb and forefinger. You can hear her draw a slow breath, but she holds so, so still. You bite down harder, slowly, deliberately. When you taste blood, you spit her hand out. She immediately wraps it around your throat, her fingers tangling with all the tubes and wires that dip under your skin.

          There’s a playing card caught in the wires next to your left shoulder. Vriska notices it half a breath after you do. The two of you are frozen for a long moment, then she drops your throat to reach for the card. The black empress stares impassively up at her, with her single, dark eye. Vriska flinches back and drops the card. She looks up at you and takes another step backwards.

          You pluck the card from the floor and shuffle it back into your deck. And then you smile. “The gunner used to stack the odds.”

          Vriska sends you on a twisty path through an asteroid belt, but at the end of it, you still haven’t lost Terezi. “Her helmsman is very good,” you tell Vriska, before you lock her out of your block for being an annoyance.

          So she decides to gut your bridge. It isn’t enough that your pilot controls are broken, oh no. She hacks them out entirely, pulls out all the warning lights, _everything_. You don’t know how much she knows about engineering (you doubt it’s much), but for anyone to properly command you anymore, they’d have to refit the entire bridge, reinstall all of the equipment that Vriska is yanking out and shoving out your airlock. How much does she know? You watch her without saying a single word.

          When it’s all done, she stands in the bridge, in front of the shreds of what used to be your controls. The ghost of your old captain stands in front of her, gills fluttering in distress as she looks at the ship she used to command. Vriska watches her silently, her fists clenched at her sides. You fly onward.

          Eight days later, things haven’t improved, but you need supplies. You set down on DiOC6 and Vriska heads out into the city. It’s less of a dump than Colchecine. You can’t track her through the security cameras, even though you try.

          She comes back hours later, high on— _something_ , covered in new scrapes and cuts. And a neck covered in bruises and bite marks. When she’s back on the ship, she heads straight for the crew quarters and flops on her bunk, laughing, “239 sweeps old, but I’ve _still_ got game—”

          The last shreds of your patience evaporate. You grab her by the wrists and haul her upright.

          “Hey, _hey—”_ she complains, but you only drag her harder. She stumbles into the helmsblock, saying, “Gonna name this piece of shit _Starfucker_ on account of—all this. Everything. Fits the history. Hope you hate it.”

          You do. “So what diseased gutter-trash did you pail last night?”

          “All of it that had legs,” she slurs. She reaches out a hand for your chest, and for a moment, you freeze, uncertain of what she’s going to do. But she just traces your sign with a single claw, forwards and backwards, up and down your thorax. “You don’t have legs.”

          That explains some things. In _exactly_ the way you’d suspected. But it doesn’t explain all the cuts and scrapes. You can see a fresh laser burn on one of her boots. What isn’t she telling you? No, you know what? You don’t _care_ what she’s telling you. “That’s disgusting,” you tell her, and wrench away from the claw still tracing your sign.

          She settles her weight back on her feet and leers up at you. “Vile,” she agrees. Like this, you can’t miss her bloody lip. The bite marks on her collarbone. But then you can’t miss the way she gingerly shrugs her coat off, working around some injury you can’t see.

          You tell her, “With or without the ugly coat, you still look like an asshole.”

          She’s up against you then, before you have time to react. She’s kissing you, her tongue between your teeth. You bite her and moan. Her claws are digging into your shoulders, sparks of pain among all the pinpricks of your wires and tubes, her weight dragging you down in your column, pulling at you until what’s left of your arms aches with it. You grab her horns with your psionics, yank her head back so you can kiss her properly, bite at her lips while she bites at yours, until everything tastes like blood and heat. From this close, you can feel her in your pan, even though—you don’t think it’s intentional. You don’t think she’s trying to do anything. You let her stay there.

          Eventually, she pulls back for air, licking her lips. Her claws are still deep in your shoulders. “You look like a machine,” she says, and you can _hear_ the lie in her words, you can _feel_ the lie in her pan, and it’s shameless and _infuriating—_

          You pick her up in your psionics, drag her out of your block and back into the crew quarters. You pin her to her bunk. She fights and shouts and yells until her voice starts to give out. But you hold her there until she finally stops struggling and goes to sleep.

          And still, you keep at least a little of your attention on her all night, watching her for hours, until she wakes up again. The ghosts are all there with her, when she finally starts to move. They sit on their bunks, shuffling through their ship’s log, talking quietly together. You wonder if it’s more unsettling to see them when you can’t hear what they’re saying.

          Vriska still asks them, “Aren’t you pissed at how she killed you?”

          The ghosts turn and stare.

          After a long moment, the pilot reaches out to place her translucent hand over Vriska’s left eye.

          Vriska is frozen for half a heartbeat before she bolts. She scrabbles backwards, away from the ghosts. She edges off the furthest corner of her bunk, and even your cameras can pick up the way her hands are shaking. And you wonder whether she can hear the way you’re laughing and laughing.

          You aren’t ready for the attack when it comes. You’ve been waiting and _waiting_ for weeks, but even then, you still aren’t ready. Vriska is doing— _something_ in your bridge, something that involves sledgehammers, apparently. She assures you that this is an important part of getting ready to install some nice new weapons systems, and let’s be real, you’ll put up with a _lot_ if it means you’ll get some big new guns equipped.

          You don’t know what happens, but suddenly a chunk of hull is _gone_ , just _gone_ , and you’re burning and it hurts, it _hurts_ , like someone cut off your legs all over again—Vriska is lying on the floor, struggling to roll over, she’s hurt—you don’t know—you can’t tell anything, you’re trying to fight through the shock and use your psionics, _something_ to hold your hull together, and it _hurts—_

          Vriska screams, “Aradia, you _bitch!_ I’m going to kill you, if it’s the last thing I do, I’m going to tear you apart and sell you and let someone else tie you down so tight you’ll never get free again—”

          You wail, “No, it wasn’t, I _didn’t—”_ And it’s too much, you can’t speak anymore, you can’t find the words, it’s all you can do to hold your body, your _ship_ together. You have to hold your hull. You _have_ to. Vriska is there. Vriska is up there. She’s hurt. _Nobody_ hurts Vriska but _you_ , she’s _yours—_

          And then you feel the helmsman inside you. Part of you is watching Vriska struggle to her feet. Her left arm is gone, half her face too— Part of you watches her stumble down the hall. But there’s someone behind you, _in_ you, watching over your shoulder. He has your engines, he has your comms, he has _everything_ , you’re in there, but _you’re_ the ghost now, and no matter how loudly you scream, nobody can hear a word you say.

          You watch as Vriska hauls herself up by your jumpsuit, yells in your face. And that’s all you can do. Then one of your viewscreens comes to life, like someone is puppeteering your hand from the outside. You’d be sick if you could.

          >> _termiinal open_

          >> _port: 11011110 AA_

          >> _transmii22iion_

          >

          > **VR1SK4**

          > **VR1SK4**

          > **VR1SK4 P4Y 4TT3NT1ON**

          “No,” Vriska mutters, leaning against your wall, trying to focus on your screen. There’s blood everywhere. “Get out of my ship,” she slurs. “Get out of Aradia. Give Aradia back.”

          > **W3 4R3 W41T1NG FOR YOU TO G1V3 US 4 R34SON NOT TO SHOOT YOU DOWN**

          > **FOR 1NST4NC3**

          > **PROM1S1NG TO N3V3R K1LL 3R1D4N 4MPOR4 3V3R 4G41N**

          > **OR COM1NG HOM3**

          Vriska shuts her eyes. “Thanks for the offer, Pyrope. Appreciate it. I know everyone is _actually_ secretly grateful I put that eel down, because we all know I did the entire empire a huge fucking favor. But I’m fine. I don’t need your help. I don’t _want_ your help.”

          > **VR1SK4 YOUR SHI1P 1S F4LL1NG 4P4RT**

          “Whose fault is that??”

          > **OK4Y Y3S 1 4M SORRY 4BOUT TH4T**

          > **4ND W4 W1LL G3T YOU 4 N3W 4RM**

** > 4LSO W3 4R3 ST1LL W41T1NG ON THOS3 R34SONS**

          > **BY TH3 W4Y**

          “Fuck you,” she whispers. She slides down until she’s sitting on the ground, slumped against the wall. She’s struggling to keep her eyes open. A larger screen on the other side of your block comes online.

          > **1F YOU SURR3ND3R YOU W1LL R3C13V3 4 F41R TR14L**

          > **YOU W3R3 DO1NG WH4T YOU THOUGHT W4S R1GHT**

          “Terezi, just get off my ass for a second! Let me talk to my helmsman. How are you even doing this, I tore out all the comm lines.”

          > **MY H3LMSM4N 1S V3RY GOOD**

          >

          >> _port: 11011110 AA_

          >> _termiinal clo2ed_

          “Yeah, fine, whatever. _Thanks_ , I’ll be here, _dying_ , whenever you get back.”

          You’re almost afraid to try your body again. It wasn’t you, it wasn’t _yours_ , even more than when you’ve been buried under layers of helmsman programming, or even when you could feel Vriska crawling into your pan. But you draw one unsteady breath. Let yourself exhale. When you try to move, you can’t help hissing with pain.

          Vriska isn’t looking at you. She isn’t looking at much of anything. She’s staring at the door of your helmsblock. The ghost of your old captain is standing there, but you don’t know if Vriska even sees her. Vriska’s eyes keep drifting closed, then lurching open.

          You’re not sure she’s even conscious anymore, until she says, “She thinks the Empress won’t kill me. New laws. Mercy. All that bullshit. Terezi’s smart, but she doesn’t _get it_.”

          You can’t find your words, at first. All you can do is struggle to breathe. Eventually you manage, “I guess you’ll find out.”

          Vriska lifts her hand, waves it vaguely. “But you. Reoutfit. For sure. Empire isn’t too stable yet, aren’t that many psionics out there. Especially not conveniently pre-installed.” She laughs, and it sounds more like a pained wheeze. “Nice ending, huh? New hardware. Bigger ship. Bigger block. Works out real good for you.”

          You don’t have an answer for that. The ghost of your old captain is still at the block door, but you can see the other ghosts lurking in the corners of the room. Vriska tips her head back to look at you, and you can’t see any expression on her, only the pain lining her face.

          The two of you watch each other for a long moment. Finally, she says, “Aradia, I—” The words catch. She swears, closes her eyes. You can see her mouth twist before she tries again. “If someone’s going to kill me, I’d want you to be the one who takes me down.”

          For a second, two, three, you don’t know what to say. Then you blink, and deliberately sniff. “You’re bleeding out. Doesn’t matter much anymore, I’d say.”

          “Fuck that,” she says without opening her eyes. “I’ve had worse. And I’m still here. Come the fuck on, Terezi’s going to hack into your brain again any moment. What are you going to do about it?”

          You take a long, slow breath. “I’m going to fly us through a star again.”

          She laughs, winces at the pain, and keeps on laughing. “That’s a _terrible_ plan, you lunatic.”

          You smile. “I know.”

          Terezi’s ship has you outmatched in every way. But you get the drop on her and push your engines as hard as you can, straight for the nearest star. You can feel her missiles slamming into you, but you don’t have time for that, you don’t have time for pain, you can feel the heat and gravity pulling you down and in. The ghosts clutch at each other, lost and bewildered, and Vriska slumps at the base of your helmscolumn, motionless, her eyes shut.

-*-

          The char from a flight through the outer corona of a star leaves your chassis a pitch carbon-black. Against Enderid’s night sky, you’re almost invisible, a shadow only outlined by the stars you block out as you pass. Since the moment Vriska came back to you with her new metal arm, she’s been talking about how you could use some more crew. Maybe some people whose records _also_ have lovely labels like ‘traitor’ and ‘confirmed dead.’

          When you set down in the field where she told you to meet her, the first thing she does is pound on your hull with her new metal arm, and because that’s not bad enough, she drags a claw through the char to mark her sign out, almost as tall as she is. _Her_ sign. Not _yours?_ You swear at her over your speakers as she steps back to admire her work.

          She marks her sign, _again_ , but smaller, next to the airlock, before she swings up through your hatch. _That_ one was just to annoy you. The next time she falls asleep, your engraving your sign right on her arm, just watch.

          “Stop whining,” she says. “You love it! It’s perfect, we’re rogue agents now. Come on, let’s blow something up. You know you want to.”

          You begin to disagree, and hesitate. Should you? “Enderid _does_ have extensive helmsman outfitting facilities.”

          And you don’t even know why you were worried, because Vriska just laughs and grins from ear to ear. “Fuck it,” she says, “That should be fun.” You let your engines roar to life as Vriska settles into the gunner’s chair, and as you lift off, you can feel the guns humming inside you as they come online. Vriska raps on your hull, the bright sound of metal on metal, and leans back in her chair. “Let’s do this!”


End file.
